


The Magnificent Seven by Jock Steele

by Kayim



Series: Falling Skies (Mag7 AU) [2]
Category: Falling Skies, Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Gen, Mag7 Bingo Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-17
Updated: 2011-07-17
Packaged: 2017-10-21 11:55:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/224918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kayim/pseuds/Kayim
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the Mag7 Bingo Prompt of "Hey, it’s that guy! – minor characters". A Mag7 AU set in the Falling Skies universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Magnificent Seven by Jock Steele

I never wanted to be a journalist, or any kind of writer, but I’m not much use in any other way. Mary Travis does most of the hard work, but I wanted to write this story. She’s struggling to get the radios up and running right now, which has to take priority over everything else, so she was happy to let me.

I was in college when the attack started, in my first year of a computer programming degree. Pretty pointless now, at least until they can get the electronics working again. If they ever can. I wasn’t enjoying college, to be honest – there was too much theory and not enough practice – but I was hoping it would get a little easier over time. I’d moved over 300 miles away from my parents and was stuck in the middle of a city where I knew no one.

And then the attack happened. I’m not going to reiterate what happened – I’m sure there will be hundreds of recollections about that over time, and this isn't the story I want to tell today – but I will say that it was, for most of us, not the most terrifying thing that could happen. That dubious honor goes to the night they started taking the children.

Mary tells me that none of the Seven knew each other before coming here, but I find that hard to believe. They work together seamlessly, as though they’ve been together for their whole lives. Chris can give an order with nothing more than a nod of his head, and the rest of them will understand exactly what to do. I went with them a few days ago on a recon mission. There wasn’t any fighting that night (although I think they would have rushed right in had I not been with them), but their teamwork was clearly in evidence. Josiah and Nathan especially seem to work in sync; despite their completely opposing appearances, they behave like identical twins when they’re out. Buck and JD usually team up, and I’ve heard jokes that it’s to keep all the trouble in one place, but it’s more than that. Buck’s taken young JD under his wing. Like the rest of the team, they don’t talk much about their families or their lives before, but it’s obvious that JD clings to the older man like a father figure. And that leaves the core group. Chris, Ezra and Vin. Three men so different in every possible way, and yet they move in perfect unison; one mind in three bodies.

These seven men – The Magnificent Seven, some have taken to calling them, after the characters in that old movie – are the only thing standing between us and the Skitters. During the day, they work with the rest of us, securing the Old Town Hall where we're currently living, learning to build better weapons and figuring out some of the less life-threatening but equally important challenges – such as how to feed over a hundred people with nothing more than a camping stove and an open fire.

But it's at night that they live up to the nickname we gave them. The seven of them will head out in an old battered pickup truck, risking their lives every time, in order to keep us safe. Or as safe as possible. They don't need to, but they do it because they can. They're the trued heroes of this war. A preacher, a professional gambler (at least that's what Ezra tells people he is – it's not always possible to know when he's bluffing or telling the truth), an ex-cop, a trainee teacher, a medical student, a coffee barista and whatever Chris Larabee used to be. The most eclectic group of people you can imagine, and yet they came together to protect us. Call it fate or destiny, kismet or just luck. It doesn't matter. Whatever brought them to Four Corners, it did so for a reason.

On top of the dozens of Skitters and Mechs they've taken down, they've also managed to rescue four harnessed kids so far. We don't know how to get the harnesses off yet, but Nathan is working on it during the day. I can see the conflict in him when I watch him work. He wants to be able to wake the kids up, Billy Travis especially, but he has to keep them sedated. The first one we kept awake… well, let's just say that none of us want to repeat that disaster. I'm not sure when Nathan actually sleeps, but he always insists that he's fine. His girlfriend, Rain, helps whenever she can, but I can see she's worried about him too.

Josiah's the one keeping everyone calm. He has a presence about him that seems to make everything better. He's set up a room in the back of the Town Hall as a prayer room and it's a rare day that it's not got people congregating in there. At night, when the sounds outside are loud and terrifying, several of us wait in there. I'm not a religious man, never have been, but Josiah's presence, even when he's not there, makes me feel safer.

The kids we have here that aren't harnessed are looked after during the day by JD and Casey. I'm not sure Casey enjoys being with the kids quite as much as JD does, but I've seen the way she looks at the young man, so she's content to stay there. I swear JD's not much older than some of the kids here, but he's doing his best to keep up their education while they're here. "We'll need it after," he told me when I asked him why. "After we win, and the world gets back to normal, these kids will be the ones who get everything up and running again." That sums JD up to a tee.

Vin, Ezra and Buck are the ones we turn to for security issues. I'm pretty sure there's more to Vin than a guy who made coffee for a living, but he's keeping tight-lipped about it. Ezra can strategize better than anyone I've ever met – if he was in charge up in DC, the war would have been over by now – and Buck knows some of the more dirty tricks we can use for self-defense. Says he saw the same things being used by the gangs in the East Side.

And then there's Chris Larabee. I don't know what to say about him, to be honest. He's an enigma - his actions speak louder than any words I can think of. He knows every person here. Knows who they're with, who they've lost, what they can do. He knows who will fight when it comes to it, who will need protecting. Like many others, he lost a son in the attack and rumor has it that his wife died in the first wave, but he never speaks about either of them. There’s something dark in him that scares me.

The advantage is that the Skitters seem to be scared of him too. And that’s what keeps him and his team alive. And they're what keep the rest of us alive.


End file.
